****** Follow up to this – this band no longer exists! Apparently we did have some trouble brewing 😉 Awwww band drama. However I have a great new line up (Zac stayed!). And these tips are still valid for the touring musician. 😉 ****************

How to get your band from Duluth to Nashville to record for two days without killing each other

I’m embellishing of course! I didn’t exactly TAKE my band against their will! I invited them to come and record four songs with me at an awesome studio in Nashville called Welcome to 1979. In 2014 I won a prize of one free day of recording from their Battle of the Bands thing and wanted to cash in on it! April seemed like a good month to go. Not as risky driving from northern Minnesota and wouldn’t we all like to get away from the mud and muck and end of winter drear? And isn’t this a dream come true for a lot of musicians???! Wasn’t too hard to convince them it would be fun. 🙂

Hello lovely!

I hope the end of March is inspiring some roaring in YOU like the lion it is running out with! It’s been one helluva month and I hope yours was awesome, and a little less crazy than mine! This was my email newsletter to my subscribers – thought I’d update the rest of you, too 🙂 Please sign up to never miss a beat!

Gonna keep this update quick because I’m typing with one hand! After playing the super fun & fantastic Dulutsen festival last weekend, I took advantage of one of the perks – free lift ticket! I tried snowboarding for the first time, did an awesome cartwheel, crashed down on my right shoulder and now it’s in a sling. Bad rotator cuff sprain and a bit of fractured humerus. Can’t lift my arm for 6 weeks! Just in time to record in Nashville (April 3 – 10) and open my yoga studio in Minneapolis (get the keys April 1, grand opening June 11th thankfully).

Doesn’t life have fabulous timing??? I don’t find it very humerus … get it??? Humerus instead of humorous???? Bwaaaa haa haaa

I sit in deep reflection, staring out the window at lightly falling snow in this cold/crusty/beautiful northern city, thinking about the past year that Holy Bones has been roaming around the world.

Holy Bones is my 6th full length album and signaled an artistic turn for me. After being mostly a solo, piano-based singer-songwriter I found that I was boring myself and felt compelled to change and follow the muse. She led me to a heavier, grungier, indie-rock, electric guitar sound. I found some like-minded musicians to collaborate with and bring that sound to life, starting from simple guitar demos to full throttle, darkly synthesized song creations.

I may have alienated some long-time fans (sorry dears – you know I love ya!), but other people graciously said, “it’s like when Dylan went electric” (in no way do I compare myself to Dylan, but was nice to hear) – the example being that the stylistic shift could be polarizing – people wanting you to keep doing the same thing (which I understand) vs. exploring other realms of the psyche …

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In a late-summer-storm-weather-coming-in, tourist-obstacled, Lake Superior moment I ran into my friend Gaelynn Lea who was busking on Duluth’s lakewalk. I was out for a stroll with one of my besties, Sara Alexander (fab music teacher & musician based in Virginia, MN) and we started gabbing it up w/ Gaelynn.

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I’ve been nursing my 6th album Holy Bones for three weeks now. Comparing albums and songs to creative “babies” is nothing new to me, but here is a list why this album specifically fits that description:

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It is with great pleasure that I announce that “Holy Bones,” my sixth studio album, is almost finished!

It has taken wild dreams of cleaving grand pianos in half with table saws, pushing my keyboard in its wheeled case down the hill into the lake, guitar lessons and a rotating cast of talented and vibrant band members … but FINALLY, by the end of this year, my 9 song electric guitar-based album “Holy Bones” will be recorded! Cannot wait to share it with you, my friends!

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I was recently asked by a musical peer for some advice regarding recording in the studio for the first time. It can be daunting to go into a recording studio, even after going in a few times. The pressure! Expectations! Not everyone is going the studio route these days since it’s fairly easy to record right at home on your computer, or even your smartphone. I miss the days of recording on cassette players myself, but tapes ARE making a come back 😉 I prefer to go into a studio for most of my recordings because I like to leave it to the techie pros to work their magic, and be less inhibited in my performance without worry that it wasn’t captured. Here are some of my answers to my friend’s questions and I hope that they help you if you’re considering embarking into a studio! Do you, dear reader, have any recording advice for first-timers that I’m missing? Please comment below and enlighten us!